A Warrior Dies Only Once
by Free Thought
Summary: Luke the Warrior drowns to ensure his nemesis dies, but what was going through his mind as he plummeted into the depths of the sea? One-shot.


**Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or circumstance these characters are in. They all belong to Brian Jacques.**

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**A Warrior Dies Only Once**

Floorboards cracked beneath my footpaws and the ship snapped and creaked in protest as the sea wrapped its waves around us, pulling us down to the depths. The briny waters scorched my wounds, reminding me again of my fate while I gripped my captive closer to my chest. A stoat screech and wriggled in my grasp, but his movements were nothing to my strength, my hatred, my resolve to see him die in my paws.

He bit into my arm when the ocean lapped up to our chests, but I ignored him and embraced the hurt; focussing on the pain instead of the fear welling inside my heart. One last time I pulled the shackle. It did not move. I was held. I was bound. I was trapped.

Quicker my body gasped at the air, but it felt like nothing reached my lungs. Nothing. I was drowning. Drowning on the very air that would keep my alive. Could keep me alive. Should keep me alive. Wasn't keeping me alive.

Panic bolted through my body like lightning as the cold waters swirled around my neck and I was lifted off the broken quarter deck and my body was held parallel to the decking. A single sob escaped my throat before I gulped my sadness down and for a brief moment it felt as though I was holding the wreckage afloat with my body; that the vessel was suspended from my wrist like a pendulum on an iron chain and for that short time I held hope that somehow I would be saved. Somehow I would be able to hold the weight afloat. Somehow I would live.

But then the moment ended. I winced as the ship mass tore at my arm and shoulder, and with one last feeble attempt at life, I took a deep breath before I was pulled beneath the surface.

The vermin screamed in my arms and orbs of bubbled life escaped his mouth and lungs. I held him tighter, tighter, tighter, digging my claws into his flesh in my anger. I was going to die. I was going to die for _him._ Because of _him_ I would never see my son again, never see my home, my friends, the sunrise, the sunset; never feel the sand between my footclaws or the grass beneath my paws. I would never feel the warmth of the fire or smell a meal being cooked or taste a drop of fresh water from a cool spring. I would never laugh, never smile, never, never, never…

His eyes were wild and wide with fear when he twisted around to face me and I could see him gulping water, sucking it as if to extract life from the airless void around us. Once, twice, thrice, he gulped and gagged; his body convulsing as his stomach filled with liquid and then his lungs, his throat, his mouth, his nose… his eyes. He inhaled on last time and then stilled- never more to move. Vilu Daskar was dead.

My lungs were screaming for new air and the weight of the water pressed in from all around me, threating to squeeze it out of me.

_No,_ I thought despairingly, but I was not afraid of death. I was a warrior. I was brave.

I let go of my captive and let his body float away from me. I did not want his filth near me in the end. With both paws I griped the wheel and steered my cist to its resting place, down into the abyss.

Into the darkness I drove my watery pyre and added my own tears to the sea's mass. In the shadows I saw my life flash before my eyes. My father, my mother, my one time home. My childhood friends and my travels. I saw my Sayna- her smiling face and loving expression. She reached for me and I lifted a paw from the helm and stretched it out for her as I past by. I smiled when our clawtips touched and I felt my heart swell with all the love I still had for her.

The air was trailing from my mouth now, large bubbles curled and grew out from the corners of my lips and slipped past my ears. I contracted every muscle I had control over still in attempt to hold my lungs from gulping in the void that would swallow me whole.

Further I fell with the ship, the cold making my body numb and unresponsive to my mind's wishes. My grip started to loosen on the wheel and one by one my claws crept off the curved wood.

It was then I saw my son; I saw my Martin and he waved to me, grinned at me, as innocently as if he were welcoming me home. Pride filled my chest at the sight of him. My son. I was so proud of my son, and I never told him I was. I never… no, there were too many nevers- this was not going to be one of them.

"I'm proud of you, Martin," I said into the black waters of the sea, clenching my throat muscles tight to deny the water entry. "I'm so proud of my son…"

I couldn't hold my strain. I couldn't stop it as water rushed in my mouth and down into my stomach, filling it with striking cold liquid. My eyes widened and I coughed at the feel of daggers stabbing me from the inside out. I gasped and water waved into my lungs.

Fear reached me then and I panicked. Letting go of the helm, I pulled at the chain, clawed at the shackle, bit at my own flesh; anything not to be dragged down even further into the shadows. Anything not to die.

Water dashed into my throat, brimming my ears and mouth; I gnawed faster at my wrist, harder, quicker… A vision flashed before my eyes and I ceased my self-mutilation, holding the chain with my free paw to steady myself. My Sayna floated in the depths below me, her paws clasp together and she bit her lower lip in excitement.

_Luke,_ she breathed and held her paws out. _Don't be afraid- come to me. It will be all right._

I ached to hold her again, to wrap my paws around her and embrace her body to mine once more. I blinked and felt the water rising in my eyes. I felt no pain and let the waters pull my arms wide to collect her into my clasp. The moment we touched, I felt my soul separate from my body and I watched as it slipped away from me, down to the seafloor with the ship. And I was there- poised in the sea, hovering in the waters with my love curled into me.

_Luke,_ she sighed and rubbed her face into my shoulder. _My Luke._

_Sayna,_ I whispered, breathing in the cool liquid into my lungs; the water that I breathe.

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**I know- it's a lot darker stuff than I usually write, but I had the itch to do it. You can all thank Florence and the Machine's song, "Never Let Me Go" for it as I listened to it and immediately thought of Luke. If you haven't heard it- listen to it. It's a beautiful song. Actually made me cry, which I NEVER DO. **


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